Whoopie Pie Bakers: Volume Two (Amish Romance Short Story Serial): Kneeling to Heaven Read online

  “She isn’t pressing charges against your brother or the outlaws,” the deputy said. “And Ben’s left town, but she’s not telling us where he went. She’s covering for him.” He shook his head, the wind blowing his ashen hair. “I don’t care how close that I am to my children. If one gave up my baby for a drug trade- gone -bad, I’d let ‘em sit in jail until he rots! Five years, Ms. Miller. We’ve looked for that baby for five long years!”

  Esther cooled down and took a deep breath. He hadn’t understood how the Old Order worked. You forgive. Not matter what. You forget. “We forgive and believe that Gott seeks justice, not us.”

  He shook his head and extended his left hand out as he backed up to stop the car behind them. “That’s not how we operate in the real world. I doubt your mother will get Emma back. The social services unit is flabbergasted that your mother would even think about forgetting about this.” He wiggled his arm in a stopped position, rain beating down, patching his brown shirt sleeve. “You’re backing up traffic. Again, I am sorry for your loss.”

  “We haven’t lost Emma!” Esther yelled, and the deputy nodded toward the tangled car. Esther turned and looked. Positioned at the back side of the tumbled mess was a red-soaked black bonnet. Esther rolled the passenger window down and yelled at the Pennsylvania State Trooper that was snapping a picture of the mess. “Was Emma in the car? Will the social worker give her to me?”

  A stray tear slid down the trooper’s cheek before he added, “Emma isn’t back yet. But your adopted sister was in the wreck. She had come home to welcome Emma back. I am sorry for your loss.” He gave a solemn nod, but Esther didn’t understand what he had meant. She had no adopted sister.

  None at all. “Maybe another Miller girl from another familye?” thought Esther as she drew a puzzled gaze toward the tall trooper. The trooper maintained eye contact until she broke the gaze and turned from the window. They think my schwester’s been killed. I have no adopted schwester. She tilted her head and cocked a brow. “I have no adopted schwester. Maybe mistaken identity?”

  “I knew that, but even if it is a mistaken identity, it is sad. One of our members has lost a dochder.” Jacob said before lowering his voice, “A sad day for Lancaster.”

  Esther nodded and bit her bottom lip. Her mind was back on Jacob’s soul. How in the world could she convince him to love the Lord again? The right way. The holy way.

  The Old Order Amish way.

  Esther leaned against the cold glass and stared down at the rain-slicked two-lane highway. She couldn’t explain why the man sitting next to her was so important. He’d made her firing mad by turning her into the bishop, but she still was concerned about it as she would be her bruders if they had slipped away. Still, it wasn’t a woman’s place to say anything to him. Here, he was acting confident and strong, but the Bible clearly said that the toughest men fight giants.

  With Christ. The Savior. The Victor. The Conqueror.

  Emma hunched into the warm seat and reflected on Jacob’s possible walk with the Lord. Was Christ still the apple of Jacob’s eye, or was his new double-cabbed pick-up truck. Did members that leave desire earthly things instead of heavenly treasures? And most of all, did they lose sight?

  Of God?

  The car had a slick snow-white body with black-rubber wheels the size of ten Shoofly pies. And the massive tire rims seemed to be for decoration instead of a purpose. The inside was hot and a large, glowing radio stuck out in the middle of the console directly above the multi-control heating element. The pick-up was expensive and quite comfortable. Was the world a cozy, pleasurable place? Maybe that was why very few people wanted to visit their Amish church services every other Sunday. Esther had thought it had been the language barrier as services are spoken in High German. Since Loblied, the Amish praise song, was the second song sung during church services, maybe newcomers could learn the song after many visits.

  But there were no visits, even by Jacob Smith once he had left, he had left.

  Here, Esther in his oversized pick-up truck in a seat that was big enough to lie down in. A cold rain pouring down on the windshield almost as fast as the large, black windshield wipers could slush it away and onto the chilled two-lane road. Life was cold, although it should be somewhat warm for Esther. But it wasn’t warm, no matter how good the hot heaters fanned her body and swayed her black apron and dark cape dress hem amidst her ankles. Emma was on her way home, but there were questions unanswered, problems to deal reckon with within her family. Esther’s brain hurt as did her heart. She didn’t want to deal with the unanswered questions. Emma was home so that should be good enough.

  But it wasn’t.

  If Esther’s Mamm was protecting Ben, it was wrong in the law’s eyes and in Esther’s eyes. Esther’s blue eyes deepened to almost a deep navy shade, her black brow arching back with her creased, sweaty forehead. She rolled her eyes and bent her neck onto the warm seat and got lost in her thoughts. Five long years, I’ve waited, and, now, look what we have: an investigation against my mamm, my bruders; my familye! How on earth? Her black eyelashes flickered around deep, busy navy-misted eyes. If her mamm had lied, shame on her! She’d never speak to her again. If she had suspected Emma’s whereabouts, she should have told the law and Esther! Surely, a woman of Gott would not lie like that to protect an adopted son.

  Nervously, Esther titled her head off the warm seat; her eyes met a ruffled hitchhiker, left thumb out for a ride. It was one of the three outlaws. The eldest one. The meanest-looking one. The dirtiest-looking one.

  The one that took Emma. But Esther couldn’t prove it.

  One day she would.

  Jacob drove on by and said, “There’s no way I am picking up any of those men. I know how you feel about them.”

  Esther turned and looked back as the man put a shiny silver gun to his head and pulled the trigger.

  ~CHAPTER SIX~

  Jacob Smith turned the large pick-up around, almost taking the rear end off the left side of the steep roadside. A hundred-foot ridge nestled against the curve, and the rain-slicked asphalt was spilling over rain like an open faucet. This part of Lancaster County was known to flood, so he should have expected it. But he didn’t. Maybe it was the stress of the day with social services threatening to take Emma. Maybe it was the idea of an-almost killer getting away. Maybe it was him. He’d not slept well, thinking about Esther and whether she was mad at him for telling Bishop Smucker about her plans to go with the three outlaws to New York City.

  For he knew the truth. But he hadn’t the guts to tell such a beautiful, sweet-natured girl. She was Amish, and he had once been. Esther was naive. He was not. But he had once been before the day.

  That he’d made the phone call to the shanty. He had to.

  To save Esther’s life from the outlaws, the almost-killers. He’d never tell anyone, but he’d made another phone call to Cozumel, Mexico, to a friend who could get any kidnapping cancelled. Esther had not known Raymond and Ben well. Those men were more than criminals, outcasts from the Amish.

  They had debts. Bad debts. Business debts. Debts that would only be settled by taking a family member. A Shuldiner that could never settle the bill.

  Without a ransom.

  Emma had a quarter of a million dollar price tag on her forehead. Jacob was short with Esther as he pulled next to the bloody scene and swung the truck door open, “Now stay here and don’t do anything stupid! They could blame you for this man’s death since you’d threatened to be at the court house the day he’d be brought to trial!’

  Esther nodded and kept her head looking out the frosty windshield of the warm truck. She had said that she’d be the first one at the court house. But she would never hurt anyone. The Old Order didn’t believe in it. She had wanted to take matters into her own hands, but her Christian nature had taken over.

  Or maybe it was because the Bishop had found out.

  Esther should have felt sorry for the outlaw. But she didn’t. She didn’t have compassion in her chest
for him. She didn’t hate him; she just couldn’t care whether he lived or died. Finally, Esther turned around and saw Jacob doing CPR on the outlaw. Rage flushed her as she jumped out of the truck and screamed, “Jacob, you can’t do CPR! Do you know who he is? You’ve got to know!”

  Jacob didn’t say a word; he just continued doing compressions and giving breaths. Esther was crying, wondering why Jacob would want to save a man that had perhaps abducted her sister. “Jacob, why? Why?” Esther stood, stooped over her swaying cape dress, her white prayer kapp strings bobbling mid-air as thick, cold rain poured down her face. Brown- soaked leaves rolled atop the rain-drenched asphalt, reminding her of the seasons of life. Gott had returned Emma, so He had also returned the life to this hard-core outlaw.

  Finally, Jacob got a pulse, a thread one, but he had one. Shallow, uneven breaths left the wicked man’s chest, and Jacob swung his black cell phone open and entered 911. “This is Jacob Smith, and I have a man that’s shot himself.”

  The 911 dispatcher asked, “Where are you, and is he breathing?”

  “Five miles away from the wreck that the deputy is working towards town. And he is now breathing, and I have a weak pulse.”

  “I’ve got units dispatched to the scene. Do you know the man?”

  Jacob tilted the now-blood ridden cell phone and said, “Yes, he is my older brother.”

  ~CHAPTER SEVEN~

  The FBI Agent looked in the rearview mirror of the black Chevy Suburban and studied the ten-year-old, blond-haired Amish girl for safety. Having a height of fifty-four inches, she was a good candidate for riding the Typhoon Lagoon at Disneyworld. Having a weight over “the five-year-old average,” she could stand to stay away from some of Pam’s chocolate Whoopie pies. But so could her agent-husband. The Agent, Heather Renee Hostettler, turned her head to the agent that sat next her, Whoopie pies in his lap. He’d already been bored enough to devour a couple of red velvet Whoopies. He was now on the first chocolate one.

  Heather eyed his white-crème-patched mouth and said, “You know that I can make those for you at home?” She looked back in the mirror and saw Emma entertaining herself with her pink-dressed, faceless rag doll. “Maybe the doll reminded the little girl about her Amish family, kept her company,” thought Heather Renee as she tilted her head in the mirror and smiled. Her husband’s cell phone rung and he dropped white-chocolate crumbs atop his star-badged lanyard. “To busy eating to answer the phone?” Heather shook her head.

  “You’re kidding me! The Amish don’t believe in revenge! There’s no way!” He reached up and wiped the excess white crème from his lips with his right arm, the cell phone loosely to his left ear, his eyes stressed. “She bolted!”

  Heather Renee’s stomach twisted, and she turned her attention to the fast-paced visions of rural interstate farmland. She could vomit at any minute. She cranked down the driver’s window for fresh air, and her agent-husband punched the passenger’s side switch to roll it back up.

  He said, “Remember, we drive with all windows rolled up for safety.” He rested the phone against his left shoulder and reached down and tapped the air on max. “That’s better. The air conditioning sure works on this vehicle.”

  And the air did on all witness protection vehicles. The routine was the same: get the victims back home to safety and hope that the abductors did the time that they deserved in prison.

  And that was why her stomach always twisted. And she always needed air. She was raised Swartzentruber. The Plain people. The strictness of the strict. The ones that didn’t bolt.

  The ones that forgave. Therefore, every time a victim’s family would try to take justice into their own hands, she’d get sick; very sick, and need the air cranked up to max.

  But that was nearly thirty years ago. And numerous kidnappings ago.

  South of the border. Mexico. The meanest of the meanest. That was their specialty: hostage negotiations that resulted in many bullets but a live victim. They had lost some, but they had won many.

  Emma was one of them.

  Her husband started sweating, and she knew what that meant: the abductor had been gotten.

  Alive.

  Heather Renee wiggled her lips before closing with a firm, good bite. She tapped the brakes of the black Suburban as she turned around the rain-slick road. She glanced over at her husband, who was closing his discussion. “Who bolted? It couldn’t have been an Amish person! We don’t believe in that!” Heather expected little Emma to blurt, “You’re not Amish! Look at your bright red lipstick and blushed eyelids. You have no kapp on!’

  But Heather Renee once had a heart-shaped one on.

  Until the day, she got abducted into slavery.

  Taken to Mexico for child slavery, Heather Renee had dreamed of escaping one day. And she had made her escape.

  The day the Feds came looking for her. After her freedom, Heather Renee worked as a police dispatcher while studying police administration at a university. She’d sometimes go back to Sarasota, Florida to see her family.

  Heather Renee missed the closeness of her Amish family. After she was released from the kidnapper, she had felt like an outcast, ‘un-Amish’ and had chosen to live a life of an outsider with modern conveniences.

  This had included her having the freedom of owning a car.

  She’s gotten used to driving and actually enjoyed it. It relieved stress and relaxed her tired shoulder muscles after firing shots alongside her agent husband on the shooting range.

  Heather Renee angled her head to peek at Emma again. The girl rested her cape-dressed rag doll against her chest as she slept. Heather Renee knew that the child wouldn’t understand their conversation. She was five. “Wait a minute, she is now ten!” Heather reminded herself silently. However, it didn’t change her thinking. Today, Emma was five years-old, over fifty-four inches tall, tall enough to ride Typhoon Lagoon at Disneyworld.

  In Heather Renee’s mind, Emma was her.

  ~CHAPTER EIGHT~

  Esther sat in the middle of Emma’s bed and wept. Just a few hours earlier, on a rain-slick road, Gott had made a decision.

  He had made the decision to allow the abductor life.

  Esther scooted her bottom across the quilted bed until her lower back reached the edge of the white wall. It was a good thing that her parents weren’t home because Esther didn’t need to be bothered.

  She needed her space. With this space, she would be able to talk to Gott and ask, “Why?” Why had He let the abductor live? He’d done their family so wrong, causing stress and illness among her family. Esther’s daed and mamm had become frail bodies, while every day for five years, they had looked for Emma to come through the front door. Their weary faces would get up, pray over their German Bibles, and look at the front door, closed shut, and locked waiting.

  Nevertheless, Emma would be coming through the front door today. It was a sure thing; however would she be the same Emma from five years ago? Had they taught her English? Had they sang songs from The Ausbund with her?

  Had they taught her about Jesus?

  Guilt pricked at Esther. Jesus was about forgiveness.

  And love.

  Still Esther had no love for the outlaw that was fighting for his life at Lancaster Regional Medical Center. So how could she possibly have forgiveness? Total forgiveness came with love, but love was rare when dealing with a man that had wreaked havoc on her entire family for five long years. Esther took a deep breath and uttered, “But at least—”

  “He didn’t let her die.”

  And he hadn’t, although Emma had not been in his presence, he was the one that authorities had thought had originally taken Emma. He was the mastermind behind the crime.

  Others followed. Moreover, her parents had done the unthinkable.

  They had forgiven.

  Esther could not. However, she had to, and she knew it as she looked down and studied the handcrafted quilt. Her grossmammi had sewn it with love. Her grossmammi did everything with love, as did her mother. Was
it possible that the outlaw’s mamm had no love? Sure, Esther had just found out that the outlaw was Jacob’s bruder, and Jacob’s bruder had once been a member of the church, but she had been a convert in her thirties. Who knows if Jacob was telling the truth about living in an Amish community in Berne? He hadn’t told her about the outlaw being his bruder. He hadn’t been honest.

  He had betrayed her.

  Would Gott let the outlaw survive the surgery that he was in, or would Gott seek justice and take his life? Would social services not let Emma stay at home because her parents had done as Jesus would have done? Esther had to wonder as she twirled her fingers on top of the heavy quilt. Today, she felt Grossmammi’s wisdom and warmth as she studied the beautiful quilt. She decided to do what Grossmammi was best at doing.

  She got off the bed, got down on her knees, formed her palms in prayer position, her elbows against the patches of thread, and talked through the clouds of heaven, to one Person who knew the answer.

  An Almighty Gott.

  The End. The Third Volume. You may purchase the next volume by clicking on the link. Volume 3: Amish Heart

  The whole novel is sold on this link. Whoopie Pie Bakers Novel

  Table of Contents

  ~DEDICATION~

  ~AMISH WORDS~

  ~CHAPTER FOUR~

  ~CHAPTER FIVE~

  ~CHAPTER SIX~

  ~CHAPTER SEVEN~

  ~CHAPTER EIGHT~